Firewall (The Firewall Spies Book 1)

by Andrew Watts

  “And after the Navy, you joined up with this firm?”

  “That’s correct,” Colt said. “I met some of their recruiters at a job fair when I was in business school. The company had a veterans program, which helped a lot.”

  “I’m familiar with Phillips and Jefferies. It’s a very good company. And it’s very impressive that you were able to land a job there.” Samantha looked at Ava.

  Actually, Aunt Samantha, I spent about eighteen months training with the CIA. But I can’t go into that because I’m trying to recruit your niece to be an agent so she can spy on her coworkers.

  “Thank you,” Colt said.

  The dinner was excellent, although Samantha’s continued interrogation got more embarrassing as the night went on.

  “And you’ve never been married? A handsome man like you?” She looked at her niece again. “Seems like a waste if you ask me, eh, Ava?”

  Ava was shaking her head. “Colt, I’m so sorry. We Jewish women aren’t known for our subtlety when it comes to matchmaking.”

  Samantha said, “Hmph. I’m only trying to help. You weren’t interested in any of the boys I tried to set you up with in New York.”

  Ava shot her a look.

  “I’ll take it as a compliment,” Colt said. He could tell that Ava appreciated his playing along.

  After dinner they went to a wine bar in downtown Banff where they ordered dessert and continued talking, drinking, and laughing.

  When her aunt was in the bathroom, Ava said, “She’s impressed. You’ve passed all of her tests.”

  “I didn’t know I was being evaluated.”

  Ava looked skeptical. “Yes, you did.”

  Colt said, “Listen, I was thinking about what you said to me. About wanting to be proud of what you are working on. About feeling like some of the things Pax AI is working on are less than ethical. There’s something I need to ask you. The other night, when we left the party, Luke Pace said something to me . . .”

  “Luke was rather drunk.”

  Colt made a face. “I don’t know. I don’t think this was the alcohol speaking.”

  “What did he say?” Ava looked worried.

  “That Kozlov died in The Facility.”

  Her face went rigid. “What?”

  “He said that the FBI was investigating the death in the wrong place. That Kozlov didn’t die in the hotel like everyone thought. He said Kozlov died in The Facility. Do you have any idea what he was talking about?”

  Ava shook her head, looking confused. “No idea. But . . . that’s not what happened.”

  “I know.”

  This part would be delicate, Colt knew. “But that’s a really weird thing to say, right?”

  “Yes. Very.”

  Colt paused, and then said, “You know as part of my work, I have been introduced to someone whose job it is to make sure that dangerous technology doesn’t fall into the wrong hands. We’re friends, and I’ve consulted with him in the past whenever I have questions about…legal issues.”

  She didn’t respond.

  Colt said, “You told me that some of the things you work on creep you out. We both know how powerful Pax AI’s technology is. Are you at all concerned that there might be something going on here that isn’t . . .”

  “Legitimate?” Ava said.

  He shrugged. “Yeah.”

  Ava’s eyes went to the floor, dancing nervously. “I don’t know. Sometimes, maybe.”

  Colt said, “This friend of mine, he’s very discreet. Maybe we should just meet with him and get his opinion about Pace’s comment. It would ease my conscience. He might have questions, though. Would you come with me? You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to.”

  “Colt, I don’t feel right about that. I wasn’t there when Pace made that comment, and I don’t know what he was talking about. Maybe he was just drunk. You can tell your friend about what Pace said if it makes you feel better. I don’t need to be there.”

  “Then where do your concerns stem from?”

  Ava said, “There has been a lot more secrecy around some of the work lately, that’s all. I’m more uneasy about the lack of visibility I have with some of The Facility projects.”

  Colt nodded. “Everyone has told me how powerful this technology is. How much it will change the world. There must be people who want to steal Pax AI’s intellectual property. You don’t worry about Kozlov’s death being related to that.”

  “Of course I do. We are all worried about it, we just don’t talk about it. It’s driving me crazy pretending everything is normal. But we have a world-class security department working round the clock to protect our secrets. I’m much less involved in the development side of the business. They keep everything that goes on at The Facility very hush-hush.” She was visibly upset.

  Colt said, “You told me you could get access to The Facility if you pushed for it. Maybe you could get both of us a tour of the place? Use me as an excuse. I’ve requested it for my work, but Miller is stalling, I think.”

  Ava’s mouth opened, but she didn’t speak. She studied Colt for a moment. The only noise was the chattering and music from the bar.

  “What do you want me to say?” she said.

  “Say you will help me.”

  “Why do you need me?”

  “Something feels off. And I need someone I can trust.”

  The structure of the sales pitch was familiar. Building trust. Fueling her fears. Massaging her concerns. Enticing her to act. But their prior relationship made this difficult.

  Ava’s dark eyes stared back at him. “It’s just . . . it’s a lot to process. I’m not sure how I feel about this. Or about you asking.”

  He was about to respond when Ava’s eyes fixed on her aunt, who was walking through the sitting area of the wine bar. Samantha saw them sitting close and talking, her expression that of a satisfied matchmaker. Colt smiled and took a swig of his drink, trying to wash away the odd mix of guilt and defeat that had come over him.

  Their night wound down after the wine bar with a slow walk back to the hotel. Samantha hugged them both and said she needed to get a good night’s sleep to catch her early flight. Then Ava and Colt shared the elevator in silence.

  Ava’s floor came first. She said goodnight and then stood there, looking at Colt as she held the elevator door so it wouldn’t close. He could sense the internal struggle going on before she spoke.

  “I’ll get us into The Facility. I’ll speak with Jeff. I know how to convince him. But I won’t speak to your friend. I don’t feel comfortable with that.”

  Colt gave her an almost imperceptible nod. “Okay.”

  She removed her hand and stepped back, and the elevator door closed.

  23

  The next day, Heather Weng stood in a grove of redwood trees in Golden Gate Park. She’d been waiting for forty minutes before a brunette woman of about forty approached.

  SANDSTONE wore yoga pants, a flowing canopy wrap sweatshirt, and sunglasses. Weng’s first thought was that Marisha Stepanova looked like a rich housewife. Her second thought was that she looked pissed off.

  She cursed in Russian and then said, “Why the hell isn’t Colt here?”

  Weng started to answer, but Marisha stormed past her. Weng rolled her eyes and began following the Russian intelligence officer up an incline, deeper into the shady grove of giant trees.

  “He had something he couldn’t miss. He asked me to apologize.”

  “When will he be back?”

  “Tonight, or maybe tomorrow.”

  “I must see him.”

  “I can help you with whatever you need. We wanted to make sure . . .”

  Marisha stopped walking and turned, her eyes blazing. “You meeting me like this is poor tradecraft. For the past three years, you have protected me by only using Colt. I don’t know you.”

  Weng could see how afraid she was. This was about more than just Colt’s absence. “Marisha . . . may I call you that?”

  She
shrugged. “That’s fine.”

  “I’ve known Colt for a long time. I learned about you only one week ago. I do the same type of work you do. And like you, I’m very good at my job. I will not take risks. I will not make mistakes that could put you in danger. Now if you think it’s time for us to take more drastic measures to protect you, we can have that discussion. Is that the situation?”

  “I don’t know,” said Marisha. She was pacing next to the trunk of a huge redwood.

  In the distance, Weng could hear the sounds of the park. People talking. Dogs barking. Helicopters and jumbo jets. Ambulance sirens. The air brakes from municipal transportation buses. But here, in this small, wooded area in the heart of a technology-driven city, two spies stood in solitude.

  Weng said, “Is there anything urgent you need me to pass on?”

  Marisha sulked. “Yes.”

  Weng waited.

  Marisha removed her cellphone from her flowing sweatshirt pocket and swiped to unlock it. She scrolled through it until she found what she was searching for, then held the screen for Weng to see.

  “I don’t speak Russian,” Weng said. Marisha’s phone showed an image of a typed letter, about one paragraph long.

  Marisha said, “My superior at the SVR has been traveling to San Francisco for an operation that, until recently, I was not part of. He has just brought me into that operation. This is an invitation.”

  “An invitation?” Weng removed her phone and opened the camera app. “May I?”

  Marisha nodded and Weng took a picture. This method of copying it would be more secure than asking Marisha to electronically send it somewhere. “An invitation for what?”

  Marisha said, “A private sale event. The SVR is going to purchase Pax AI’s language-prediction algorithm.”

  Weng looked up at Marisha before looking down at her picture, examining the quality. “Who is the seller?” Studying the letter, she noticed a familiar symbol on the bottom of the page.

  Marisha said, “Trinity.”

  After the meeting, Weng walked north along the beach. She called Wilcox on the way, using her CIA-issued phone.

  “Just met with her,” Weng said. “The SVR has been contacted by Trinity. SANDSTONE said they have an agent who received a paper note inviting them to a private sale. Trinity claims to have the language-prediction technology that Pax AI just announced. The same AI tech they are going to publicly demonstrate in San Francisco this Friday.”

  Wilcox said, “Do we know when or how they are making the transaction?”

  “No. This was just an invitation. I have a photo of a photo of the original. I’ll show you soon.”

  Wilcox said, “Who was the SVR agent who received this invitation?”

  “SANDSTONE didn’t know. She’s going to try and get that name.”

  “Are they inside Pax AI?”

  “I don’t know, Ed.” Weng went quiet as she passed a few beach walkers. Then she said, “SANDSTONE says the SVR thinks they can identify the Trinity mole. Their agent is trying to confirm who is stealing the technology from Pax AI. But SANDSTONE wants Colt at the next meeting.”

  “Not a problem. Did you set something up?”

  “We agreed Colt would reach out.”

  “Okay. Colt arrives today. I’ll let him know. Get back here so we can take a look at that note.”

  “Will do.”

  Three hundred feet above the beach, a small quadcopter drone followed Weng’s path to the north. The buzzing of the rotors was drowned out by the noise of the surf. But the directional microphone on its undercarriage, augmented by sophisticated computer programs, was able to cancel out the background noise and record her side of the phone conversation.

  To the Chinese Ministry of State Security, Heather Weng was a known CIA intelligence officer. Her presence in the San Francisco Bay Area had been noted by MSS facial recognition programs. The Chinese intelligence service’s cyber operations division had hacked into San Francisco’s CCTV cameras four years ago, and MSS AI programs now sifted through millions of faces there each day. The MSS mostly used this information to track anti-Chinese dissidents who traveled in the city. But that same cyber division also knew that Heather Weng, until recently, had been stationed in the Vancouver area, most likely under the leadership of the CIA’s head of station there, Ed Wilcox.

  Weng’s presence in the city was interesting enough that the MSS approved a small surveillance team to monitor her activities. The quadcopter drone had been launched from the Golden Gate Park. It transmitted the recorded conversation back to the MSS-owned minivan, which, if inspected, would show several custom-installed antennas. The data was received and evaluated by an analyst inside the van, who realized its importance right away. He downloaded the file from the drone to his computer and sent it to his superiors in an encrypted email. He then wiped all evidence of the recording from the drone.

  In the Consulate General of the People’s Republic of China in San Francisco, Liu Xing, the MSS’s top spy in the city, sat at his desk. He had been reading through emails from Beijing while eating lunch when the knock at his door came. One of his operations officers came in, excited.

  “Sir, please check your email. You need to listen to something,” the man said.

  Liu did so. At first, he struggled with the quality of the recording. But after his second time hearing the conversation, he understood the significance.

  “Trinity?” Liu said.

  The operations officer nodded.

  “Our reports on Trinity do not support this capability.”

  “Correct, sir.”

  “It could be that the Russians are playing games with the CIA,” Liu said.

  “What do you want me to do?” his subordinate asked.

  Liu stood, looking out his window at the San Francisco skyline. He took a moment to think about what he had just heard. Pax AI was one of their primary economic espionage targets. The company’s AI advances were mind-boggling, and Beijing was obsessed with catching up to them. Liu had personally worked on developing penetration agents at the company, but it had been difficult.

  Liu said, “The SVR runs its West Coast agents out of their Houston consulate now, correct?”

  The Russian consulate in San Francisco had been shut down in 2017 by the US State Department. A tit-for-tat measure taken after the Russians ordered more than seven hundred US diplomats expelled from their country, a response to American sanctions following Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

  “Yes, sir. Houston.”

  Liu said, “Find out who the rezident is in Houston. Tell him that I would like a word with him in private. And if possible, make sure no one else in his organization knows about it.”

  “What will you do?”

  Liu said, “If this Trinity group is really selling Pax AI technology, we want a seat at the table.”

  “But why would the Russians . . . ah. I see.”

  Liu smiled as his subordinate made the connection. “Yes. The SVR will help us because we can offer what they value most. The name of a traitor.”

  24

  Colt didn’t know what she said to Jeff Kim, but Ava had come through. Facility access was approved, much earlier than expected. Kim was even taking time out of his busy schedule to go with them.

  A Mercedes SUV dropped the three of them off at the private helipad section of San Francisco International Airport. Colt hadn’t flown on a helicopter since he was in the Navy, and that had been just a few times strapped in the back of a barren cabin, barely able to hear anything over the engine noise.

  This was a whole different experience. Pax AI’s helicopter had plush leather seats, prepped lunches, and beverages on ice, and soundproofed cabin walls allowed them to have a conversation while they flew.

  They took off, heading over the bay. Out the window, Colt had an amazing view of the city. The Golden Gate Bridge. Alcatraz. Soon they were over wine country, the hilly vineyards of Sonoma and Napa below.

  Jeff Kim was r
eading something on a tablet computer while munching on a turkey wrap, oblivious to the stunning views. Ava saw Colt’s expression and smiled. But her face held a hint of fatigue. She didn’t like lying, Colt knew.

  He asked, “How long is the flight out there?”

  Kim looked up from the tablet. “About an hour. Miller provided your security brief?”

  Colt nodded. “No cellphones, no communication in or out while we’re inside. I can’t believe your employees do multiweek shifts like that. Do you ever stay there that long, Jeff?”

  Kim shook his head. “I’m afraid I could never get away for that amount of time.” He held up the tablet. “The company would go up in flames. I would love to, though. I would like to get more hands-on with our experiments. But I only get in to see The Facility during the changeover between crews. We have three of them. Each one spends a few weeks inside The Facility, then a month or so working out of our San Francisco office. I go over the results with the team on the fourth floor where I can look at the recordings and data. But we don’t run any of the live experiments unless The Facility is locked down.”

  Colt said, “Why is that?”

  Kim said, “You will see.”

  Ava pointed. “Here we are.”

  Colt looked out his window. The helicopter zoomed a few hundred feet over dark green pines. A freshly paved road sliced through the forest below. He saw a perpendicular cutout in the trees ahead and a double ring of razor wire fence, about twenty feet between them. The two lines of razor wire formed a perimeter, which intersected the road at a manned security gate. Their helicopter flew overhead, and Colt counted four armed guards and two off-road vehicles.

  “Those guys look like they are wearing military uniforms.”

  Kim said, “Yes, the US Air Force guards that outer perimeter gate. That was in our contract with the Department of Defense. The internal security is privately run.” Colt wanted to ask more but thought better of it.